After the final buzzer sounded in Iowa City that brought Mark Kellogg’s inaugural season at WVU to a close, the nation got a glimpse of the Mountaineers’ women’s basketball squad’s potential moving forward.
The team went into the heart of the loudest environment in women’s college hoops and competed for 40 minutes against the face of the sport, Caitlin Clark. Falling behind by double digits multiple times, Kellogg’s team tied the game against Iowa with just over two minutes left in the game. They would ultimately lose and have their unexpected season come to a close.
That night, the team held the nation’s highest scoring offense to their lowest of the season, 64 points, and quickly set their eyes on the future. A future that could spell something special in the upcoming season.
Coming into the 2024-2025 season, the Mountaineers returned four of their five starters from a year prior and added key transfers and freshmen to surround the best defensive backcourt in the Big 12, JJ Quinerly, the conference’s Defensive Player of the Year and Jordan Harrison, another Big 12 All Defensive Team Selection.
It did not take long for the team to look forward to next season and Coach Kellogg to immediately set a goal for this year’s team to get an NCAA Tournament game in Morgantown. With the current format of the NCAA Women’s Tournament, the first two rounds are hosted by all the one through four seeds. That comes out to be the top 16 seeded teams getting March Madness games on their home floor.
It just so happens that in the preseason AP Poll, the Mountaineers were voted as the 16th team in the country and have already moved up the 15th after the first week of play.
West Virginia has started their season off with a 3-0 start, beating Towson, Niagara, and Pitt by an average of 47 points. Like they did much of last season, the Mountaineers are using a full court press to speed teams up and create offense through their defense.
In the first three games of the season, WVU has forced a nation leading average of 35.3 turnovers per game. It wasn’t too long ago when Morgantown was selling T-Shirts with “Press Virginia” on them in lore of Bob Huggins’ defensive style. Now, Coach Kellogg has brought that type of grit and physicality back to the university.
Despite the dominating start to the season, the team has yet to receive an efficient offensive game from their All-American, Quinerly. The senior is shooting just 31 percent from the field and 11 percent from three (2/17). And while Kellogg has stated the team will need Quinerly to be better moving forward, it surely has to scare opponents to think this WVVU team has yet to play to their full potential.
Junior guards Jordan Harrison and Sydney Shaw have both picked up the slack on the offensive end while Quinerly has struggled. Harrison has averaged a team leading 19.3 points and 6.3 assists while Shaw has broken her career high twice to start the year, averaging 16.7 points while shooting 50 percent from three (10/20).
Freshman Jordan Thomas has come into the program and added much needed rebounding help for WVU, the weakest part of their game a season ago. The Texas native is averaging eight points and five rebounds in just 13 minutes of play to start her collegiate career.
Looking down the road this early into a season can be a slippery slope, but the Mountaineers appear to be one of the most talented, athletic, and deepest teams in the country. The goal of hosting an NCAA Tournament game in Morgantown feels incredibly achievable, but WVU might have their eyes set even further into the Madness, such as an Elite Eight appearance.
West Virginia has never hosted an NCAA Tournament as the last time the Mountaineers were a top four seed was in 2014 when they obtained a four seed. That was one year before the NCAA switched the women’s tournament for the top 4 seeds to host the first two rounds in 2015.
Mark Kellogg has the Mountaineers rolling and his Press Virginia style might just lead to the national spotlight shining bright on Morgantown.
